If the rate of suicides during May — all among men, and mostly teens or young adults — continued for the year, the number of suicides in the Marshalls would be about double its worst year ever, 2003, when 26 people committed suicide.
Ebeye Hospital officials and National Police on Majuro confirmed this week that there have been four completed suicides and one suspected case in May.
Earlier this week, a woman in one of Majuro’s downtown neighborhoods was out collecting firewood when she discovered a young man who had hung himself from a tree on the near the Triple J/Payless Supermarket.
National Police Sergeant Carney Terry said police were notified of the suicide on Tuesday of an 18-year-old male and are investigating it. Family members told the police the young man was an 11th grader at Marshall Islands High School.
Earlier in May, Thompson Tellobwij, the student body president of the National Vocational Training Institute’s senior class, committed suicide just days before graduation. At the time of his death acquaintances say he was carrying out his practicum — work experience — at the Marshall Islands Environmental Protection Authority.
Police also reported that another man, working on one of the fishing vessels in Majuro lagoon, was found dead from an apparent suicide.
Meanwhile, two weeks ago on Ebeye Island, a man in his 20’s committed suicide. Hospital officials said the young man had been drunk when the incident took place. Earlier in May an Ebeye man in his 40’s also committed suicide after a domestic dispute.
The suicide rate in the Marshall Islands appears on the rise after a three-year when an average of fewer than seven reported suicides per year occurred. But the number more than doubled from 2007 to 2009, with 14 suicides reported in 2009.
Ministry of Health statistics show that more people committed suicide in the 2000s than in the 1980s. The average annual suicide rate was 9.2 from 1980-1989, government statistics show. That rose to 10.5 per year in the next decade, and has risen to an average of 12 each year from 2000 through 2009.
